For nearly an hour, the driver of a tractor-trailer was trapped in his cab as it dangled high above the Ohio River on the side of a bridge in Kentucky after a multi-vehicle crash Friday.
From the bridge, emergency personnel shouted directions to the driver. Emergency crews set up a rope system and lowered Bryce Carden, a firefighter from Louisville, Kentucky, to rescue her.
“Thank God,” the driver said when Mr. Carden leveled the cab of the truck, he recalled at a news conference on Friday.
At first, Mr. Carden said, he struggled to free the female driver from her seat belt.
“We got a free pocket knife during our practice and I had it on me, so I was able to cut her from the seat belt,” he said in a phone interview Saturday. “I was able to get her out and put the rest of the harness on her.”
The driver and Mr. Carden, who were now attached to each other, were about 100 feet above the river by the time they were hoisted to the bridge, a process which took about five minutes.
“I kept telling her, ‘I’ve got you, I’ve got you,'” Mr Carden said on Saturday. “She was just thanking God and then I said to her, ‘Let’s just keep praying together.'”
Unbeknownst to Mr Carden and the driver, news crews had gathered and drones captured stunning footage of the rescue, some of which was broadcast live.
“I had no idea how many people were watching,” he said. “I was focused on the task at hand.”
He said the driver, who has not been publicly identified, remained calm during the rescue operation until she returned to the top of the bridge, the George Rogers Clark Memorial Bridge, which connects Louisville, Kentucky, to southern Indiana.
“I think all the emotions kind of came and it hit her that she might have died,” he said.
Mr Carden said he had practiced the rope rescue technique so many times it had become “second nature”, but Friday was the first time he used it in an emergency.
At a news conference Friday, Louisville Fire Chief Brian O’Neill called the rescue “a once-in-a-career thing.”
He said rescuers were dealing with a precarious and unpredictable situation, given that the tractor trailer was “essentially pressed against the concrete, as well as one of the bridge supports that was holding it in place”.
“We were very concerned about stabilization there to make sure our people were safe,” he said. “We’re willing to risk a lot to save a lot, so yes, we’re willing to take that risk to get her out, but we were constantly worried that the truck could move at any moment.”
Chief O’Neill described Mr. Carden as one of the “nicest, happiest guys” and just the guy to lead the high-stakes rescue.
“He’s the right person to put in there to keep the patient calm and cool and collected and know he’s in safe hands so he doesn’t panic,” Chief O’Neill said.
The driver was taken to a hospital and treated for non-life-threatening injuries, the Louisville Police Department said.
The tow truck broke through the guardrail after a crash with three other vehicles around noon, police said. Two other patients, who have not been identified, were also taken to a hospital for injuries that were serious and potentially life-threatening, officials said.
The truck was removed from the bridge Friday evening. The bridge was supposed to be partially open by Saturday evening, state transportation officials said on social media.
For Mr. Carden, after the rescue, it was a long night of taking calls, returning to the normal life of the firehouse, answering text messages from loved ones and doing interviews with news outlets.
“We just went back to work,” he said. “I didn’t get to talk to my wife until three hours later.”
